Now is probably a good a time as any to admit to myself/ the internet/ the world the problems I have with food.  I've only recently realised how obsessed I've always been with it in one way or another; in bed the other night I was contemplating some childhood memories and it dawned on me how many of the most vivid ones involve food - not necessarily the happiest or most important memories - but nevertheless I've retained them. Probably the most interesting of these are:

1. We never kept crisps in the house, until when I was probably about 7 or 8 and the football world cup was on and my dad bought a huge box of Walkers cheese and onion crisps. I was allowed one packet every day when the match was on, but I remember sneaking some away afterwards and eating up to four packets a day.
2. When I was very young, as soon as my plate was set down in front of me, I had an obsessive habit with immediately separating out what I was and wasn't going to eat. My mum always recollects how it was surprisingly hard to get me to eat a whole meal for a long time, and then suddenly it was impossible to get me to stop.
3. Similar to the last one but much more amusing, is another obsessive habit I had of re-enacting the scene in the Lion King where Timone and Pumba introduce Simba to eating insects - so I'd say all the lines and only eat a mouthful when Timone or Pumba or Simba eat an insect in the film, and then start the scene all over again.
4. (God these are all coming back to me now) I used to love drawing people, particularly my friends and family, and every time I'd draw someone I'd write their name and age above their picture, and whether they were skinny, normal or fat.

I honestly don't know when I started to put on weight; I guess it was about 7 or 8, but I was always tall for my age and I don't ever remember wearing clothes designed for my age even when I was tiny. I think my issues have possibly got worse recently; when I was in France over Easter my parents and sister were cooing over a photo of me they found when I was about two or three - but all I could really think was how fat I looked in it.

So there were periods when I was a teenager when I actively tried to eat less, and I was probably my skinniest right after I broke up with Sophia the first time. Then in year 12 when I was getting the shit bullied out of me for coming out, I started making myself throw up. The first time it happened was when I got home from a house party really, really drunk - I needed to be sick but it wasn't coming so I just helped it along a bit. I don't know, the incident doesn't really stick out in my mind as the start of anything. I've never, ever thought of myself as bulimic even when I was doing it 2-3 times a week during sixth form - partly because I reckoned I never did enough for it to count, and partly because I didn't think I was losing weight (which I wasn't, but I get a horrible suspicion sometimes that the reason I've put on so much weight at university is because I've mostly stopped). I couldn't even admit to myself properly in my diary, just drawing a little square by the date so I'd know I'd thrown up that day.

Things were (and still are) especially bad when I'm left on my own - I almost always order a shit ton of food, eat it really quickly and then throw up. This happened a lot more during sixth form because my parents went to France a lot, but much less since I've been at university because I'm almost always around Triston. But when I'm not, the binging and purging has been worse - before I tended to only do it alone at home, but since it's also been the toilets of fast food restaurants and in my car at service stations.

Anyway, I've vaguely been on a diet for the past few months, and probably the most unintentional good that I've done is start a blog (http://thingswhichieat.blogspot.co.uk/ if you're super bored) where I solely record what I eat and drink every day. When I started it I was scared I'd become more obsessed, but I actually feel really proud when I can write a post where everything is reasonably healthy and I haven't over-eaten. The (vx) symbols are when I've voluntarily thrown up, (ivx) is where I've involuntarily thrown up.

It's a long haul, and nobody knows any of this apart from Cat, but it's been a relief to get it all down. I could go on forever about everything else to do with food that's happened in my life; like how there was a huge book this girl had written of everything she ate in a year at an art exhibition in Hungary and my sister had to tear me away from it because I just stood there and read it the whole time we were there, or how (I don't know if this is really related or not) I'm incredibly terrified of cooking for other people and I still get super paranoid even making food for Triston and I'm always convinced everything's burnt or tastes horrible. Anyway, I'll stop now.